Hybridity in Monica Ali's Brick Lane and Arundhati Roy's the God of Small Things

This study presents an analysis of Monica Ali's Brick Lane and Arundhati Roy's The God of Small Things. In each novel, the characters go into a transformation period to find their identities in the cultures they live in. The first chapter explains the theory of postcolonialism by focusing on the ideas of Edward Said, Frantz Fanon, Robert Young, Bill Ashcroft and others. Terms such as hybridity, mimicry, ambivalence and cultural identity are defined mainly in reference to Homi Bhabha. The hybrid characters with different problems find different techniques to cope with them and they reach different levels of hybridity which is studied in detail in the second and third chapters. The final chapter draws a conclusion commenting on different hybrid situations. Finally, it is observed that all hybrid characters try to find their own voice to create a 'Third Space' but only some of them can achieve this.